how long to 18/6 or 14/10

[joohn]

i was read alot about increases females to males ration and found this in a article by Dutch Passion stating "Hours of daylight: few hours of daylight (e.g. 14 hours) makes for more female individuals, a long day (e.g. 18 hours) makes for more male plants." what is recommend by most grows first time growers

 

[oshritah]

this is the first time i heared about something like this.........???

 

[odiemea]

how about 16/8 ??
under 1000w mh

 

[Smokin Moose]

How about 24 under a 1000W. I just popped 6 beans of Piefke's Power and got 5 females. I always veg under 24 hrs.

 

[odiemea]

must be cautious of ele $$ a sharp spike might draw unwanted attention even though myself out here with with my condition i am legal by state standards
my question is more about how the change in light hour's would affect my girl's.
if any ??

 

[Smokin Moose]

There has been a lot of conjecture on this, with no firm conclusions. I wish I had a more definitive answer for you. The breeders around the world are still toying with this, and many other options as well. For the moment this will have to remain anecdotal advice till proved one way or t'other.

 

[odiemea]

well i guess I'll keep it at 16 & 8
keep posting as they progress
so far they look beautiful & healthy
i was wondering how tall do the clone's need to be to induce flowering ?.

doing only personal growth so i don't need giant's there about 2/3 inch's in hight using a ebb & flow with a reservoir but i am working at getting on a continuous harvesting cycle

 

[Got Humboldt?]

mine are at 18/6 cycle. just transplanted 4 days ago, and now under 1000w HPS. will go to 12/12 for flower
i'll post pics after the second week of veg, and plan to veg for about 4 weeks, some where between 12 and 18 inches high. My idea is the sea of green approach.

 

[wutwut]

I read this 14/10 hour for more females in Jorge Cervantes Growers Bible. Along with more blue light, high humidity, and lower temps.

I tried this for the 1st time a few weeks ago. I use a 430 watt son agro bulb and started with standard cool white Floros and felt they were growing weak and switched back to my HPS at a 2.5 feet away and noticed them not stretching. They started growing faster and more sturdy. After 2 weeks I started making the days longer by a few hours a day and wet to 24/0. I got 5 out of 6 females, but could not tell you if it was luck. I'm kind of shitting myself because I feel like I have a ton of pre-flowers and think that I might have started the flowering cycle. It's been about 2 weeks or more since 24/0 has been on and I swear it looks like they are not growing symmetrical, but no budding is occurring. If I cause hermie's I will pull all of my short & curlies out 1 by one. I had fem seeds for my 1st 4-5 grows and never looked for pre-flowers before. They were all genetic herms and was blaming myself the whole time. I order reg sees and am hoping or my 1st and long awaited sensi crop. The only good thing is I've read like a mother and now know a fair amount, but am far from an expert. I'll let you know what happens. I'll be putting them under 12/12 in the next few days and will know in abut 4 weeks. My balls always took 4-5 weeks to sow up after inducing flowering

 

[Boss]

My first grow I veg'd 24/0 for 40 days. 5 of 6 were female. Went 12/12 from seed all of them were female (but one I tossed before sexing).

I think it's soil, N and lights. So ya, the environment

 

[joohn]

well i figured it out go with what works for u and without hassel than do whats been working. and gettin 5 of 6 to be females is a pretty good ratio in my mind, i just look at is as nature takes over i think the plants sense there male to female ratio and automatical grantee a male some where in the bunch.

 

[mojo]

I've always used a 20/4 veg schedule. I chose it after reading a report by an unnamed grower who was part of a group of growers that actually researched their yield under different lighting. It's proven to be successful in my grows. Lemme see if I can find it here and I'll post it up, lol.

The following is the lighting report:

Lighting Schedule​

<o> </o>
We did a lot of experiments with light times a few years back using known sativa and sativa dominant clone lines.
<o> </o>
With Vegging under HID lights.
<o> </o>
20/4 produced the sturdiest growth and the most bulk. Best final yield, taken as 100%
22/2 Less of both growth and bulk. Yield 88%
18/6 Sturdier than 22/2 but slightly less bulk. Yield 87%
24/0 Much lighter in all aspects than 18/6. Yield 79%
16/8 The weediest plants. Yield 67%
<o> </o>
Plants vegged to final pots under fluorescents at 20w per sq ft on 18/6 yield 49%
<o> </o>
Have not tried 36 hrs dark but did try 48 hrs from 18/6 veg. The final yield was down between 15% and 20% by varying the pure sativas with the biggest loss in final weight and caused the odd herm, [sativas] it did reduce the flowering time by 5 to 8 days.
<o> </o>
For the mum lines we have 20/4 to 12/12 gives the best crop weight and bud quality, really that’s all I’m interested in.



End of report:
<o></o>


Hope this helps somebody who still is undecided on what schedule to run under.

The last several grows I've had, I've harvested about a kilo of dried bud per 3x6 tray. This is the weight I record on the jar's lid. I've grown two plants and gotten almost a kilo from the two. Seems for my "let the plants do what they want to" style of growing that's about the best I'm gonna due without scrogin them, lol.

Lighting shouldn't have any affect on the sex of the plants. Lighting stress can cause a plant to hermi on you though and that's really a survival skill the plant has - like the 5 frickin SD IBL I've got in flower right now, lol.

peace

 

[Racefan]

IMO all living things want and benefit from a rest period. Even cannabis plants. 20/4 is what I use and have never had problems from it. The only time I changed is if it was a high heat summer and then I went with a 18/6. Now that I have A/C I just stay with 20/4.

 

[Greenthumb422]

There is no way different light cycles gives a higher ratio of females to males! You folks are super!! Get a good laugh daily from this site and the things you guys say and suggest and do.

 

[afgooey]

ive just strait up never had a male green is right no light cycle is gonna change your ratio
the only thing ive found to affect seed gender is the sterility of the seed and thats what clearex is for washing seeds and thats were the soaking overnite thing came from to everyone used to put clearex in water overnite then they would put them in the paper towel and now people just put them in water and all sorts of other weird stuff to try and do whatever
i say just the good old sterial bowl with clen tp and water and a lid
and i get 100% females nomatter what strain ive used

 

[Purple Goose]

i was read alot about increases females to males ration and found this in a article by Dutch Passion stating "Hours of daylight: few hours of daylight (e.g. 14 hours) makes for more female individuals, a long day (e.g. 18 hours) makes for more male plants." what is recommend by most grows first time growers

Never heard of it every grow book I have read says 18/6 cool temps around 75 lots of nitrogen and that will give an increase in the number of males to females basically if you give the plant perfect conditions to trick its built in senses to think that its a perfect growing season and there will be no trouble being fertilized so more females because the plant is designed to maximize its repoduction and one male can spread pollen over a half mile easily. I only say this because when A friend was in afghanistan about 15 years ago there was actually pollen reports in the cities near the rift valley that warned when cannabis pollen was really high .

 

[PeterDaily]

i remember reading or hearing the same that 16/8 as soon as u c 3-set leaf patterns and a dose of nitrogen will INCREASE female ratio. So far i have one batch of 40 plants started with 18/6 to 16/8 on 1st 3-set leaf patern-half went outdoors, the ones indoors have 9/19 female plants. I have to post later in the year for the others. (hopefully). I have another batch of 40 started and today they showed 3-set leaf pattern-switching to 16/8 and will post those results too.

 

[Purple Goose]

Well from my grow books it says to use 18/6 even after the 3rd internode develops but to keep your area a temperate climate and give them generous nitrogen and they will naturally shift towards being female as during a excellent summer with good weather where they can get all the nutrients they need it seems the plant actually knows it only needs one male to fertilize miles of females. So to maximize reproduction more females are produced then males but I have also found that these females are also more likely to develop bananas if there is any stress at all in the last few weeks of flowering. Personally I Prefer to grow from clones of a plant that I have stressed and tried to force to go hermaphrodite but it wouldnt change which is called a true female as many cannabis plants will show female there entire life but will easily flip to androgynous or hermaphroditic, when you have a female that can take erratic light schedule ,nutrient stress and temp stress if it wont flip to hermie it never will nor will its clones. It is true however that a female generated by giving the plants perfect conditions is actually more fragile I personally feel all living things plant or animal need to be challenged to survive and coddling your plants by making everything perfect will make you more susceptible to failures in the long run so be a little rough with your plants you will learn how much abuse your strains can take and not turn hemi and they will be better for it as everything needs to be tested to improve on itself.

 

[PeterDaily]

CONFIRMED-09/13 outdoor plants female. so thats 18/25 plants turned female. 60% FEMALES if my math serves me well...
Regardless. im about to set out my next batch. i will post the results.

 

[StormChaos]

I posted this in another thread.... reposting it here. I use many different outside stimuli to help promote female plants. Does it work? it seems to.... I have come across these recommendations from several different sources, including breeders, books, friends and other websites.... we use them, and it seems to help.

About 2.5 months ago - I helped set a buddy of mine up with a grow. He is starting with 2gal grow bags and seeds.

He had 2 kinds of bag seeds, plus some Mandala Hash Berry and Satori that I turned him onto.

a little over 3 weeks ago, we put 12 unknown bag seed plants into flower... out of the 12 plants 3 were males and pulled.

9 days ago we put 12 into flower 6 Hash berry and 6 Satori... out of the 12 plants 4 were males 3hb and 1 satori - they were pulled....

This coming weekend we will be putting 12 more 6hb and 6 satori into flower.... and we will continue every 2 weeks.

In any case... The sex of a marijuana plant can be influenced....

We started the seeds in rock-wool cubes with a humidity dome... as soon as they all popped we transplanted directly into 2 gal grow bags with a promix/perlite mixture.

We keep the humidity of the veg area at 70%. Higher humidity helps produce females.....

We started a feed program with a nute str about 100ppm 3 weeks or so into it and slowly increased the ppms... the Nute solution has a nigher nitrogen content... Higher nitrogen helps produce females.

We don't let the grow-bag soiless mix dry out at all... moist soil helps produce females.

We also have a lower veg room temp of only 65 to 68 degrees MAX... lower temps help increase females....

We started Seedlings and Vegging under a Blue T5 and 400 MH for 14 hours a day - shorter days influence female sex.

Its important to note that these conditions are especially important once Vegetative growth starts... and even more important after the 2nd week of veg growth thru to the 5th week... and should be maintained until the sex of the plants are determined....

We will continue this until all plants have been sexed... after we are certain all males have been culled - we will change to a 24/0 veg cycle for Mothers, clones and vegging and will bring the humidity down to 40% as well as increase room temp to 70-75.

We are considering keeping a male and implementing a controlled pollination of some lower branches for seed production.